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Author Topic: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?  (Read 680 times)

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Offline Ron C2

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Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« on: December 25, 2022, 01:55:54 pm »
I thought it might be fun for those of us not living in a former ancient civilization's territory that minted coins to talk about where we've gone for the sake of coin or ancient civilization tourism.

I have been a fairly prolific traveller over the years and in the last 5 years I've been specifically targetting locations with connections to ancient numismatics.

Some of the places I've hit in the last 5 years, despite the pandemic, include:

- Rome (twice)
- Venice (twice)
- Florence (twice), including a tour with an expert in Roman florence
- Pompeii
- London
- Paris
- Orleans
- Tours
- Naples
- Amalfi with it's wonderful Roman roads
- Cinque Terra
- Verona Amphitheatre

In February I'm visiting Cairo, the Giza plateau, the valley of the kings, Aswan, Luxor, Kom Ombo and Edfu.

Curious to hear where you've all recently been.
My Ancient Coin Gallery: Click here

R. Cormier, Ottawa

Offline Dominic T

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #1 on: December 25, 2022, 03:16:08 pm »
Kaboul, P’Yongyang, Kiev, Addis Ababa and other exotic places. All with my air miles.
DT

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #2 on: December 25, 2022, 04:19:33 pm »
And please add your photos to our ancient sites photo gallery....

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=150
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Offline Ron C2

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #3 on: December 25, 2022, 04:24:45 pm »
Great idea Joe, I'll scare up some shots today or tomorrow :)
My Ancient Coin Gallery: Click here

R. Cormier, Ottawa

Offline Sap

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #4 on: December 25, 2022, 06:41:21 pm »
I have only been overseas once in my adult life. It was a 'church history tour" of Turkey in 2014 that included the cities of the Seven Churches of Revelation. One of those cities is, of course, Sardis, "the place where coins were invented". There's a section of the ruins in Sardis (modern-day Sart) that's identified as the "Mint of Croesus" - it's more the "gold refinery of Croesus", but that doesn't quite have the same ring to it for the tourists. The others on the tour group knew I collected ancient coins, so they insisted we stop there so I could see it.

Here's a picture of the site, and of the tourist info panel there.
I'll have to learn Latin someday.

Offline Sap

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #5 on: December 25, 2022, 06:58:14 pm »
One of the things I found interesting, travelling around the ancient ruins in Turkey, is that being a coin collector actually helped me understand things better.

One of the other people in the tour group I mentioned above, was a Bible College lecturer in Biblical Greek. He was astonished to find that I could actually read the Greek inscribed on the tombstones, monuments etc at the sites we visited. He was used to reading nice, clean Greek script, printed in a modern book. These monuments were inscribed sometimes in archaic characters, carved in stone, sometimes highly abbreviated and usually with bits worn away or otherwise missing. I could "read" it just fine, because reading ancient Greek coins is exactly the same.

Here's a tomb from the necropolis in Hierapolis (modern Pamukkale), not far from Laodicea.
I'll have to learn Latin someday.

Offline Ron C2

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #6 on: December 25, 2022, 09:11:45 pm »
I uploaded a few photos from Rome and Venice today that some might find interesting.  It takes a while to do these, I have to resize large files and put together decent writeups of each :)  This batch was all taken back in August 2022.
My Ancient Coin Gallery: Click here

R. Cormier, Ottawa

Offline Virgil H

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #7 on: December 25, 2022, 09:15:17 pm »
Love the photos and comments about Sardis, Sap. I also saw at least two of the churches of Revelations, those in Ephesus and Pergamum (Bergama).

This is a tough question for me because a combination of income and my station in life means I will possibly never be able to go to France or Turkey again. So, I don't have recent tales to tell. But, I do not worry about it because I have travelled far more than most people and have lived in Germany (it was West Germany then), Turkey, and South Africa. Because I lived in those places, I travelled all over Western Europe, as well as Southern Africa. Plus I have spent extensive time in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Kuwait. I have been to Australia and Japan decades ago and had a plane change in Rio de Janeiro, so I can claim to have been on all continents except Antartica.

My coin collecting definitely reflects my travels as long as ancient/medieval coins go and I collect coins from places I have been to (although not exclusively), hence my interest in Afghanistan, specifically Kabul and Gandhara and Ghazna.

My most recent international travels ended in late 2012 and started in early 2011. Afghanistan and later on a stint in al-Basrah, Iraq. I took my R&R in Turkey, meeting my wife at the airport in Istanbul and renting a car where we travelled around the western part of Turkey, including over a mountain pass that was dirt and I didn't really know what I was getting into. I took her to various places I had been over 30 years before, such as Ephesus, but I highly recommend you never travel to places like that that are in range of cruise ships during the summer season. My other times in Ephesus, I was alone with my my traveling companions and we could do whatever we wanted. Things have changed a lot. The highlight was seeing Aizanoi that was off the cruise ship and tourist area madness. No one there, essentially. And we could do whatever we wanted. We there first as we drove to Ephesus and, after a day in Ephesus, changed our plans to avoid all the coastal areas and went back there for a couple more days. It was laid back and just wonderful, a small Turkish city with a Roman/Greek city all around. Then, we went farther inland and spent a few days in Eğirdir, on Turkey's second largest fresh water lake. Absolutely wonderful. It was interesting as we changed plans on the fly and didn't go to Cappadocia because of tourist season. I always recommend people travel in the off-season, but I didn't have a choice of timing for this trip. I have been to Cappadocia, but my wife will probably not get to.

If I ever get to travel again, it will be Turkey and France on top of list, but people are often surprised when I tell them I would go back to Kuwait City again happily. It is a very interesting place, great food, friendly people. That includes Failaka Island, where there is an archaeological dig of one of Alexander's cities he founded there. Actually, doubtful if he ever went there, but at least one of his commanders did. I have spent a lot of time in France, Germany, and Italy. I did go to Belgium, Spain, Switzerland, and Austria. Interestingly enough, I never made it to the Netherlands, but did to England and Ireland. I guess I could include Wales, but that was a train ride to the ferry and on to Ireland.

Virgil

Offline Ron C2

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #8 on: December 26, 2022, 11:06:38 am »
well silly me, in the gallery I mis-labelled a shot of the Severan arch as the arch of Constantine - too many photos and I was in a hurry.  sorry everyone, it's fixed now. 

Thanks *Alex for pointing that out so I could get it fixed.  Correct photo now added :)
My Ancient Coin Gallery: Click here

R. Cormier, Ottawa

Offline PeterD

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #9 on: December 26, 2022, 01:17:22 pm »
Many years ago I started a 'Historical Sites' page https://www.forumancientcoins.com/historia/sites_intro.htm on my website, which might be of interest. There are 7 articles, but the two most interesting for this discussion are: 'Graeco-Roman cities of the Aegean coast of Turkey' https://www.forumancientcoins.com/historia/turkey/turkey.htm and 'An inspection of the Limes of Africa Proconsularis' https://www.forumancientcoins.com/historia/tunisia/southern_limes.htm

Virgil, I agree with you that Kuwait is an interesting and friendly place. I was there a year after the Gulf War when there were still burnt-out tanks on the streets.

Jordan is also very interesting and friendly. Highly recommended.



Peter, London

Historia: A collection of coins with their historical context https://www.forumancientcoins.com/historia

Offline Virgil H

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #10 on: December 26, 2022, 05:23:04 pm »
Peter, love that site of yours. I have photos of the toilets at Ephesus, maybe I will upload one of them. LOL. On the ancient site photo gallery, does anyone know how to sort photos? I found I had to go to Ron's gallery page to see the photos. Nice photos. I really need to upload some of mine, especially of my trip to Aizanoi if only because it is a very unvisited site. And it is so worth going to. When I spent a couple of months in Kuwait, the only visible thing from the invasion was a bombed out Roy Rogers fast food place. That was kind of strange. There are still lots of relics, like tanks and artillery pieces, in the desert outside of town and on Failaika Island.

Virgil

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Re: Have you travelled to ancient coin-related places?
« Reply #11 on: January 27, 2023, 11:03:36 pm »
I've all over Israel and Jerusalem, Tzfat, Hebron


 

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